Lost In Translation
by bonafake
Summary: ONE-SHOT: They're standing in the middle of the hallway, and Draco is holding his Econ textbook like it's a lifeline, and he's looking at Hermione like he needs her. It's desperate, animalistic—the kind of expression she'd expect from someone trapped in a place they can't get out from—an expression formed out of obligation. Need. DM/HG. Previously take back your memories.


**take back your memories**

 _By: BonaFake_

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 **Author's Note** : _A quick lil dramione one shot, while I labor through my original novel. Yay for progress! Hmu on tumblr at bonafake for more information about The Thing. Probably I should not be doing this right now._

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She meets Draco Malfoy for the first time on a Saturday. He's carrying a portmanteau—inherently pretentious, cracked dark brown leather revealing nothing but the money he'd clearly spent trying to make something new look _old_ and he—he fucking _sneers_ —maybe at her school-rumpled blouse and Sears-brand jeans or her cup of plain black Starbucks—but either way—she _sees_ it and it's _inflammatory_.

It's abrupt, and it's cruel, and in that very fucking _minute_ —Hermione decides that no, she does _not_ like this person.

"So you're the new person the manager was telling me about," he says, viciously swiping his pale hair from his forehead.

"Hermione Granger." She doesn't say _pleased to meet you_ because she's _not_ and he either doesn't _notice_ or doesn't _care_ because he says, "Draco Malfoy," perfunctory and polite, and walks into his own apartment—directly across the hall from her, because _apparently_ fate has something against her and Hermione—

She doesn't _quite_ bang her forehead on the wall but she—she's _close_.

—

Draco Malfoy, it seems, is the worst kind of asshole. He wakes up at five Mondays through Fridays to go on his morning run—which she's almost _certain_ is just him putting on running shorts and walking to the nearest hipster-ish coffee shop—five minutes away, not even _subtle_ —and ordering a caramel machiatto to piss everyone off and _sitting there_ for all of an hour and a half and look fucking _smug_ —and he leaves his fancy biodegradable coffee cups with recycled drinks sleeves on the banister when he comes back, and he only goes to classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and whenever he's _not_ in class, he's blasting obnoxious indie guitar music from Bose speakers and whenever she comes back from her work-study job he's _there_ , with a few other lacrosse players and whatever other obnoxious boys he can rustle up—to—to hoot and howl and generally be a menace and—

Hermione could go on. He's a nuisance. A dick. Incorrigible.

Too bad he lives in the apartment across from her.

—

Harry comes over to check out her apartment after three fucking _weeks_ of cohabiting the same fucking hall as Draco Malfoy and he—he's absolutely no help at all. He jokes around with the lacrosse bros and makes a date with Pansy _fucking_ Parkinson—still not sure where that one came from—and _definitely_ makes Draco Malfoy even more set on pissing her off.

"Not sure what the problem is, 'Mione," he says.

Hermione—she stomps and storms over to Draco's house and tries to rescind the date Harry's made and passive-aggressively leaves twenty three empty, coffee-stained Starbucks cups on his doorstep and—it does absolutely nothing.

The next week, the coffee cups on the banister increase.

The indie-hipster music plays louder and she's almost certain that his footsteps are heavier on the creaking wooden stairway.

She is _so_ fucking _done_.

—

They get into a fight on the fourth week that she's stayed in Riddle's apartment complex.

It was expected.

Most of the other residents leave for the rest of the day—the scream-shout no-yes fuck you-fuck off becomes too much, too much—and Hermione—she's literally _just_ given the shittiest speech of the entire _year_ in her Public Speaking class—and if she wasn't done _last_ week—well, this week is the straw that breaks the camel's back. They're standing in the middle of the hallway, and they're both clutching coffee cups.

" _Honestly_ , Malfoy! You can't even keep your shitty music—"

"—excuse _you_ —"

"—inside your fucking apartment and then your fucking _coffee cups_ —"

"—have _great_ taste, it's just a pity you can't fucking _see_ it—"

"—literally all over the building—"

"—should have fucking _known_ you'd be like this—"

"—marking your territory or whatever kind of sadomasochistic shit you've got going on—"

— _what_ was that _comment_ even—"

"Marking your territory," Hermione replies stiffly.

Draco stares at her for a second. Laughs. "Good _god_."

"You _are_ ," she insists. "You—you put your coffee cups on the banister and play all that shitty music and go to that hipster coffee shop—"

"—has literally nothing to do with what we're talking about—"

"Whatever. You _are_ ," she says staunchly.

"I—I leave the coffee cups on the banister for my Aunt Bellatrix," he says, a laugh in his voice—a sort of lightening, like all the switches have been flipped upwards on the voltage in an old house. "She's kind of insane."

Hermione takes a breath. Lets it out. "Jesus _christ_."

"I sort of wish we'd started out on a different foot, huh?" he says, the corner of his mouth turning up—that self-deprecating grin she's seen too many times in the past few weeks. Draco's face is flushed, the kind that she's only ever seen when he's pissed off at her.

"I—yeah," she replies, oddly hushed.

And Hermione—as much as she wishes that their fight _didn't_ change things, it—it _does_.

They leave the coffee cups in front of Tom Riddle's door.

—

Draco's father is arrested for tax evasion on the twenty-ninth of October. Hermione remembers because it's the first time a fight with him has ended in screaming and slammed doors—well, since she'd learned about his mentally unstable aunt.

They're standing in the middle of the hallway, and Draco is holding his Econ textbook like it's a lifeline, and he's looking at Hermione like he _needs_ her. It's desperate, animalistic—the kind of expression she'd expect from someone trapped in a place they can't get out from—an expression formed out of obligation. Need. "We—we're _family_ —of _course_ I'm flying out—"

"—to a white collar prison in _Virginia_ —"

"—kind of _have_ to, he's paying for my college—"

"—actually _going_ to college, what a novel idea—"

"—mother wants me to—"

"—heading out to _Virginia_ during _your midterms_ , what kind of family—"

"Republican."

She glares stiffly. "You don't _have_ to."

"Yeah, I fucking do because unlike _some people_ I didn't fucking leave the second I turned eighteen and actually give a fuck about my parents," he snaps back.

Hermione flinches. Stops. Turns around and slams the door behind her. It's too much. It's _too much_. He has to fucking know that. He fucking _has_ to.

She has too much to drink that night, a glass or two or five of bottom-shelf Chardonnay and she tries to nurse her hurt feelings and vindictively hopes Draco is feeling the same way. Or, if possible, _worse_. Her hangover is monumental and when she finally gets out of bed at two in the afternoon he's gone.

—

Draco comes back to Columbia with a tie crumpled in his hands and a heavy leather briefcase and a dejected, puppy dog look in his eyes. The only thing he says to Hermione is, "Hi."

A bit blasé for a guy that flung a mostly-empty coffee cup at her closing door two weeks ago.

"Hi," she returns. "So—"

"Shitty," Draco says. "I—missed you. And midterms."

She wants to laugh or cry or _something_ —something other than stand there and want him right back. "Hi. My name's Hermione Granger," she says. "Pleased to meet you."

The glaze he gives her is playful, curious and strange all at once. "What are you doing?"

"Giving us a fresh start."

Draco's nod is slow and careful. "Hi, Hermione. I'm Draco. Do—do you want to get coffee with me?"

The kiss, she thinks later, when he _insists_ she didn't answer him, is answer enough.


End file.
